Charles  F.  Beach 


France 

and  Her 

Industrial  Needs 


Address  at  the  twenty-third 
Annual  Convention  of  the 
National  Association  of  Manufacturers 
Waldorf-Astoria,  New  York 
May  21,  1918 


Charles  F.  Beach 


France 

and  Her 

Industrial  Needs 


Address  at  the  twenty-third 
Annual  Convention  of  the 
National  Association  of  Manufacturers 
Waldorf-Astoria,  New  York 
May  21,  191 8 


France 
and  Her  Industrial  Needs 


TV/TR.  Chairman  and  Gentlemen: 
When  a  lawyer  addresses  him- 
self to  a  body  of  experts  like  the 
National  Association  of  Manufactur- 
ers about  their  own  business  he 
ought  to  realize  that  it  is  a  case  of 
the  militia  against  the  regular  army. 
My  only  excuse  for  being  here  to-day 
and  for  speaking  to  you  upon  such 
a  subject  as  has  been  assigned  to 
me  is  that  I  have  lived  and  been  in 
business  in  France  for  almost  a  quar- 
ter of  a  century.  In  that  length  of 
time  the  dullest  of  us  and  the  least  in- 
structed man  among  us  does  absorb 
a  certain  amount  of  the  local  color, 
and  does  find  out  a  certain  number  of 
things  that  are  going  on  around  him. 

[3] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


So  I  have  been  asked  to  talk  to  you 
about  "France  and  Her  Industrial 
Needs/'  If  I  had  phrased  it,  I  should 
rather  have  said,  "The  opportunity 
for  American  co-operation  in  France 
and  w^ith  the  French,  now^  and  after 
the  war,  along-  industrial  lines/'  I  do 
not  like  to  use  the  word  "needs''  with 
respect  to  France.  France  is  not 
needy:  France  is  not  a  mendicant: 
France  does  not  hold  out  her  hand. 
But  there  is  a  very  large  opportunity 
for  American  co-operation.  Let  us 
approach  it  from  that  angle. 

France,  under  normal  conditions,  as 
all  of  you  know,  is  the  most  self-con- 
tained country  in  Europe,  that  is  to 
say,  the  most  sufficient  unto  herself 
of  any  of  the  great  Powers.  Speak- 
ing generally,  France  produces  all  her 
necessaries  and  something  for  export : 
she  makes  all  her  luxuries  and  much 
for  export.  You  know,  for  example, 
how  a  certain  amount  of  foodstuffs  is 
exported  from  France  in  normal  times 

[4] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


to  other  countries,  notably  to  Eng- 
land; and  we  all  know  the  wealth  of 
luxurious  things  that  go  from  France 
to  every  part  of  the  earth. 

That  condition  of  things  is  the  re- 
sult, first  of  her  exceptionally  fortun- 
ate geographical  position,  her  varied 
climate,  and  her  fertile  soil  intelli- 
gently tilled;  and  second,  of  the  diver- 
sification of  her  manufacturing  indus- 
tries. France,  as  you  know,  is  a  country 
of  small,  independent  proprietors  and 
small  manufacturers.  The  wealth  of 
the  country  is  in  many  hands;  in  no 
country  is  the  wealth  so  largely  and 
so  well  distributed. 

It  takes  two  things  to  make  a  coun- 
try commercially  great:  She  must 
produce  and  she  must  distribute. 
France  produces  well  and  distributes 
better  than  any  other  country.  The 
little  has  de  laine,3.s  we  say,  is  in  every- 
body's house.  So  at  the  commence- 
ment of  the  war  France  was  taking 

[5] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


care  of  herself  and  helping  to  feed  and 
take  care  of  the  rest  of  the  world. 

When  war  was  declared,  in  a  mo- 
ment the  machinery  of  civilized  life 
in  all  its  thousand  ramifications 
stopped  short.  Every  valid  man  be- 
tween twenty  and  forty-eight  years 
of  age  was  called  to  the  colors.  Con- 
sequently trade  and  industry  of  every 
sort  came  to  a  standstill  in  an  instant, 
either  wholly  or  in  great  part,  or  was 
turned  as  quickly  as  possible  into 
some  form  of  war  industry.  War 
from  that  moment  became  the  busi- 
ness of  the  country,  and  for  four 
years  has  so  continued. 

Some  of  you  remember  the 
speech  of  General  Gallieni  when 
he  became  Minister  of  War  in  the 
early  part  of  1915.  He  said:  "In  July, 
1914,  France  wanted  peace;  peace  for 
herself  and  peace  for  her  neighbors. 
Now  France  wants  war,  war  to  the 
bitter  end."    In  that  temper  France 

[6] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


went  into  the  war  business,  and  she 
has  been  in  the  war  business  ever 
since. 

To  get  a  view  of  the  condition  of 
things  in  France  to-day,  imagine  the 
condition  of  American  industry  if  for 
four  years  your  factories  had  been 
closed,  or  diverted  from  normal  chan- 
nels of  activity.  Suppose  that  nothing 
or  almost  nothing  had  been  produced. 
Suppose  your  raw  materials  and  your 
machinery  and  your  manufactured 
product  had  been  stolen  and  trans- 
ported abroad  or  destroyed.  That  in 
general  is  the  condition  of  things  in 
France  to-day  in  respect  of  her  indus- 
trial affairs.  So  when  you  say  'What 
does  France  need,  or  what  will  France 
need  when  the  war  ends,"  a  very  gen- 
eral and  a  very  easy  answer  for  me  to 
make  at  this  moment  is  that  she  will 
need  everything. 

War,  and  especially  such  a  war  as 
this,  always  profoundly  changes  the 
character  of  a  people.  Every  modern 

[7] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


war  has  done  that.  For  example, 
throughout  the  centuries  prior  to  the 
Napoleonic  era,  the  chief  industries 
in  France  were  agriculture  and  war. 
After  the  wars  of  Napoleon  France 
became  to  a  great  extent  and  more 
and  more  a  manufacturing  country. 
This  tendency  was  stimulated  and  ac- 
centuated by  the  economic  activities 
of  the  Second  Empire,  and  pushed  to 
its  farthest  limit  by  the  war  of  1870. 

We  know,  too,  for  another  example, 
how  our  own  country  was  trans- 
formed by  our  Civil  War.  Before  the 
war  we  were  a  provincial  and  agricul- 
tural country.  After  the  war  we  be- 
came a  manufacturing,  commercial 
and  financial  power.  The  present  war 
is  certain  to  do  analagous  things  in 
France.  It  is  sure  to  work  a  radical 
change  in  the  life  of  the  country.  The 
old  France — the  France  that  we  loved 
— is  gone.  It  will  be  some  sort  of  a 
new  France  which  will  arise. 

I  believe  the  small  manufacturer 

[8] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


and  the  small  merchant  will  survive. 
That  is  in  the  Latin  blood;  but  there 
will  be  a  tendency  more  and  more  to 
consolidation,  to  concentration,  or,  to 
use  Mr.  Wilson's  word,  to  co-ordina- 
tion of  a  great  many  things  and  in  a 
great  many  directions.  That  will  be  in- 
contrast  to  the  individualization  of 
ante-war  methods  of  merchandising 
and  manufacturing  in  France. 

Before  the  war  France  was  the 
most  individualistic  country  in  the 
whole  world.  The  little  peasant,  the 
little  proprietor,  the  little  shop-keeper, 
the  little  everybody  did  their  own  do 
very  independently.  That  will  sur- 
vive, more  or  less,  but  more  than 
probably  all  that  will  somehow  be 
radically  changed. 

In  that  changed  condition,  what- 
ever it  is,  America  will  be  the  most 
favored  nation  in  anything  to  be  done 
to  co-operate  in  the  rebuilding  of 
France.  We  shall  from  every  point 
of  view  be  the  most  favored  nation. 


[9] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


We  shall  certainly  have  every  advan- 
tage over  our  chief  competitor,  Eng- 
land, in  the  working  out  of  any  plan 
for  the  rebuilding  of  France  after  the 
v^ar. 

Here  comes  in  the  matter  of  senti- 
ment. Blood  is  thicker  than  v^ater, 
but  sentiment  is  thicker  than  blood. 
^'Greater  love  hath  no  man  than  this, 
that  he  lay  dov^n  his  life"— not  for  his 
kith  and  kin,  but — "for  his  friend" — 
so  it  is  v^ritten.  I  need  not  tell  you 
that  the  sentiment  between  France 
and  America  is  something  very  beau- 
tiful. France  is  the  sweetheart  of  the 
nations,  and  America  is  her  accepted 
lover. 

This  will  give  us  an  opportunity,  in 
the  business  that  we  are  to  do  now 
and  after  the  war,  for  the  display  of 
all  of  our  tact  and  all  of  our  business 
sense.  Much  was  said  and  well  said 
to-day,  and  I  need  not  say  it  over 
again,  about  approaching  the  French 
people  from  the  proper  angle.  They 

[10] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


must  be  approached  in  the  French 
fashion.  When  I  began  to  learn  to 
speak  French  I  remember  my  teacher 
said  to  me,  "You  must  learn  to  open 
your  mouth  in  the  French  fashion.'' 
Every  American  manufacturer  or 
merchant  or  American  of  any  sort 
who  goes  abroad  to  do  things  in 
France  must  learn  to  open  his  mouth 
in  the  French  fashion.  That  is  to  say, 
he  must  learn  to  approach  the  French 
Frenchwise. 

We  must  avoid,  above  all  things, 
any  thought  or  any  air  of  going 
over  to  France  to  teach  them 
something.  The  French  do  not  need 
to  be  taught.  They  know  quite  as 
much  as  we  do,  and  they  are  quite  con- 
scious of  it.  They  do  not  wish  to 
have  us  come  over  with  a  ponderous 
air  of  showing  them.  Anything  of 
that  kind  will  be  quickly  resented,  but 
they  will  welcome  our  co-operation. 

Most  of  all — more  important  still 
than  that,  and  this  is  perhaps  only  an- 

[111 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


other  sentimental  consideration — we 
must  be  careful,  and  I  am  sure  we  shall 
be  careful,  that  no  suspicion  arises 
that  American  capital  and  enterprise 
in  going  to  France  now  seeks  to  take 
advantage  of  the  commercial  necessi- 
ties of  the  country,  or  to  acquire  any- 
dominating  interest  in  their  business. 
Elaborate  measures  of  economic  pro- 
tection against  the  infiltration  of  Ger- 
man capital  and  influence  after  the 
war  are  being  worked  out.  France 
does  not  intend  that  Germany  shall  do 
over  again  in  this  direction  what  she 
had  undertaken  to  do  before  the  war. 
All  this  opens  the  door  for  us  if  we 
enter  in  the  right  spirit — a  purpose  to 
help,  but  not  to  dominate  or  absorb. 

France  will  not  lack  capital  after 
the  war.  No  one  should  entertain  for  a 
moment  the  senseless  idea  that  France 
is  bled  white,  physically  or  financially. 
There  is  no  notion  more  foolish  than 
that  France  after  the  war  will  be 
poor.  She  will  be  no  poorer  than  any- 

[12] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


body  else.  We  shall  all  be  walking 
around  on  financial  stilts.  That  is  to 
say,  we  shall  owe  a  large  debt  and  our 
taxes  will  be  high,  but  we  shall  be  col- 
lecting interest  on  enormous  loans :  so 
that  if  a  man  collects  ten  thousand 
francs  from  interest  on  his  loan,  and 
if  he  pays  eight  thousand  francs  taxes, 
he  is  still  solvent  and  is  only  in  a  way 
going  about  on  stilts.  He  is  where  he 
was  before,  when  income  and  taxes 
were  lower. 

Capital  will  not  be  lacking  in 
France.  The  thing  that  will  be  most 
lacking  is  man  power ;  and  here  again 
is  another  danger  for  us.  The  French 
laboring  classes  will  certainly  be  jeal- 
ous— in  other  words,  will  certainly  be 
apprehensive  that  foreign  labor  may 
come  in  and  do  work  that  the  French 
are  doing  or  might  do.  They  will  be 
afraid  that  they  are  going  to  be 
^Vuined  by  cheap  Chinese  labor,'^  to 
use  a  phrase  that  we  had  in  this  coun- 
try at  one  time,  and  we  shall  have  to 

[13] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


be  careful  about  that.  But  there  will 
certainly  be  a  lack  of  man  power,  and 
there  will  be  a  chance  for  American 
enterprise  in  furnishing  labor  in 
France.  The  stronger  and  more  suc- 
cessful the  French  resistance  to  Ger- 
man intermeddling,  the  greater  that 
opening  for  us. 

Along  very  general  lines  —  I  have 
spoken  only  very  generally  because  I 
warned  you  at  the  beginning  that  I  do 
not  know  technically  very  much  about 
it — these  are  the  chances  in  France 
for  American  enterprise.  Speaking 
generally,  there  will  be  a  chance  for 
everything  and  everybody  going  to 
France  from  America  with  good  will 
and  holding  out  a  helping  hand. 
Whatever  your  business  is,  and  what- 
ever your  product,  it  is  more  than 
likely  that  there  will  be  a  market  for 
it  in  France  after  the  war,  and  that 
there  is  a  market  for  it  now,  as  far  as 
it  can  be  transported. 

Of  course,  along  particular  lines, 

[14] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


those  things  that  conflict  the  least 
with  the  French  tariff,  will  afford 
the  best  opportunities  for  American 
enterprise.  France  is  a  protective 
country:  that  is  her  undisguised 
policy.  There  is  little  thought  or 
pretense  of  a  tariff  for  revenue.  It  is 
a  tariff  for  protection,  and  that  un- 
doubtedly will  be  accentuated  after 
the  war.  But  along  those  lines  where 
the  tariff  does  not  press  will  be  the 
best  opportunity  for  American  activ- 
ity. 

I  have  made  a  list  of  certain  things 
which  may  be  suggestive,  and  yet 
I  am  almost  ashamed  to  pronounce 
it,  because  it  is  a  veritable  car- 
rying coals  to  Newcastle.  All  of  you 
probably  know  better  than  I  about 
these  things ;  but  such  things  as  shelf 
hardware,  building  hardware,  tin 
plate,  news  print  paper,  writing  paper, 
all  kinds  of  paper,  typewriters,  agri- 
cultural and  industrial  chemicals, 
foodstuffs,  shoes,  shoe  manufacturing 

[15] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


machinery  and  supplies,  underwear, 
cooking  utensils,  cheap  furniture, 
portable  houses,  cheap  gas  and  coal 
stoves  and  wall  paper — these  are 
some  of  the  things  that  will  find  a 
ready  market. 

If  any  of  you  are  paper  manufac- 
turers— and  I  hope  you  are — a  curious 
example  of  the  scarcity  of  printing 
paper  in  France  came  to  me  a  few 
months  ago  when  I  went  to  my 
printer  to  get  some  pamphlets  re- 
printed. Four  or  five  years  ago  he  had 
printed  some  pamphlets  for  me.  I 
wanted  them  reproduced.  They  were 
on  beautiful  paper.  He  said  in  de- 
spair :  '^1  cannot  furnish  that  kind  of 
paper,  but  you  are  going  to  America. 
Take  it  over  there  and  get  it  done 
there.  They  have  the  paper  and  they 
can  do  it  for  half  the  price."  News- 
papers in  France  are  now  printed  on 
the  poorest  kind  of  paper. 

All  this,  however,  is  in  a  certain 
and    larger    sense,    only  incidental 

[16] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


and  by  the  way.    The  sale  of  your 

merchandise  is  all  very  well,  but 
the  great  work,  the  fine  work,  the 
constructive  work,  the  work  at  which 
the  most  money  can  be  made — to 
speak  the  language  of  the  shop — ^will 
be  in  the  reconstruction  of  French  in- 
dustry after  the  war.  For  the  first 
few  months,  or  for  the  first  year  or 
two  there  will  undoubtedly  be  an  ac- 
tive market,  but  that  market  will  con- 
stantly shrink  back  to  normal.  The 
reconstruction  of  the  country,  the  re- 
building of  the  waste  places,  is  that 
which  will  appeal  most  to  Americans 
of  large  vision. 

When  I  say  the  building  up  of 
the  waste  places,  I  do  not  mean 
simply  the  rebuilding  of  the  devas- 
tated districts,  but  the  building  up 
of  everything  that  is  worn  out,  that 
has  rusted  out,  that  needs  renovation. 

Perhaps  here  I  might  say  a  word 
about  the  devastated  district.  I  hope 
a  few  of  you  at  least  have  seen  the 

117] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


devastation  wrought  by  the  Germans 
on  the  western  front.  In  connection 
with  the  fine  work  of  the  French 
Restoration  Fund,  in  which  I  am 
deeply  interested,  I  have  been  to  that 
front,  and  I  have  seen  that  country  in 
all  of  its  dreadful  devastation. 

You  may  see  all  the  moving  pictures 
you  like,  you  may  read  all  the  books 
you  like,  you  may  anger  your  soul  as 
much  as  you  please  at  the  thought  of 
it,  but  it  seems  to  me  you  cannot  pos- 
sibly realize  the  devastation  that  the 
Boche  has  wrought  in  that  beautiful 
country.  You  may  ride  for  miles 
through  devastated  plains  and  find 
nothing  of  the  value  of  a  sou.  Every- 
thing of  the  slightest  value  that  could 
be  stolen  has  been  stolen  by  those 
savages.  Everything  they  could  not 
steal  they  have  burned  up.  Every- 
thing they  could  jnot  burn  up  they 
have  blown  up. 

They  cut  down  the  trees,  they 
destroyed  the  shrubbery,  they  muti- 

[18] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


lated  tombs,  they  destroyed  churches 
and  hospitals  and  schools.  They  left 
an  uncounted  number  of  towns  and 
villages  in  northern  France  with  not 
one  stone  upon  another.  You  may 
ride  through  a  town  that  had  fifteen 
hundred  or  fifteen  thousand  people — 
peaceful,  quiet  civilians — and  you  can- 
not find  anything  to  carry  away  from 
that  place  that  you  could  sell  for  a 
franc. 

If  you  will  imagine  that  sort  of 
thing,  you  will  see  what  must  be  done 
when  you  rebuild  it.  When  those  peo- 
ple come  home  to  their  ruined  vil- 
lages, their  ruined  little  town,  or  their 
ruined  farm,  it  must  be  rebuilt.  The 
reconstruction  of  that  territory  is  far 
beyond  the  physical  resources  of  any 
one  country.  All  sorts  of  building 
material,  everything  that  goes  to 
start  civilized  life  again  must  be  pro- 
vided, and  there  will  be  the  opportun- 
ity for  American  industry. 

To  take  a  particular  example,  my 

[19] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


interest  at  the  moment  is  particularly 
in  the  textile  business.  Some  of  you 
perhaps  are  textile  manufacturers. 
This  industry  in  France  has  been 
practically  ruined  by  the  war.  Lille, 
Roubaix  and  Tourcoing — three  great 
cities  on  the  Belgian  border  —  have 
been  for  eight  hundred  years  the  cen- 
ter of  the  wool  spinning  and  the  wool 
weaving  industry  of  Europe.  That 
country  was  the  mother  country  of 
wool  spinning  and  weaving.  From 
there  it  spread  to  Belgium,  to  Ger- 
many and  over  to  England. 

Those  cities  being  in  the  invaded 
district,  of  course,  are  still  in  Ger- 
man hands,  and  the  industry,  as  far 
as  the  Germans  could  accomplish  it, 
has  been  wiped  out.  Those  three 
cities  at  the  beginning  of  the  war, 
as  you  remember,  were  open  cities: 
no  attempt  was  made  to  defend  them, 
and  the  Germans  rushed  in  and  took 
possession.  There  was  no  bombard- 
ment and  no  physical  destruction. 

[20] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


The  great  factories  therefore  were 
intact;  but  one  hundred  and  seventy- 
eight  firms  with  which  I  am  in  rela- 
tion— a  group  of  one  hundred  and 
seventy-eight  of  the  textile  people  in 
that  country,  cotton  and  woolen  mill 
men — have  been  robbed  in  raw  ma- 
terial and  in  finished  product  of  al- 
most a  milliard  of  francs  in  value, 
nine  hundred  and  forty-five  million 
francs,  that  is  about  $200,000,000  in 
raw  material,  in  manufactured  prod- 
uct and  in  other  personal  property. 

The  machinery  has  been  carried  off 
to  Germany,  the  buildings  have  been 
changed  to  other  uses,  so  that  when 
the  Germans  are  expelled  and  the 
owners  go  back  and  start  again,  this 
whole  industry  must  be  reconstituted. 
There  is  something  for  the  manufac- 
turers of  texjtile  machinery  in  this 
country  to  do  for  an  indefinitely  long 
period — to  reconstitute  that  industry 
with  American  capital. 

[21] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


It  seems  to  me  I  am  wasting  your 
time  in  trying  to  tell  you  of  these 
things  in  detail,  ^but  the  agricultural 
implement  business  is  another  in- 
dustry where  there  will  be  every  op- 
portunity for  American  activity.  Con- 
sider that  for  four  years  no  plows,  no 
harrows,  no  hoes,  no  shovels,  no 
spades  have  been  produced.  The  little 
farmer  has  worn  out  what  he  had  and 
he  wants  something  new. 

And  this  suggests  another  line  of 
thought.  The  lack  of  man  power  and 
the  lack  of  horses  after  the  war  will 
develop  a  tendency  to  introduce  me- 
chanical tractors  of  all  sorts,  which 
are  certain  to  be  used  in  France  much 
more  than  they  have  ever  been  used 
before. 

Some  of  you  will  say,  '^Ah,  but 
the  small  farmer,  the  little  peasant 
cannot  buy  a  tractor.  He  has  got 
only  a  little  piece  of  land.  He  plows 
it  with  one  horse,  and  he  can  never 
have  a  tractor."    Vfery  true,  but  in  no 

[22] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


country  are  the  agricultural  classes 
so  well  organized  as  they  are  in 
France.  In  almost  every  commune 
these  people  have  grouped  themselves 
together  in  an  organization  for  the 
purpose  of  buying  their  supplies  and 
selling  their  products,  so  it  will  be 
entirely  possible  that  after  the  war 
these  organizations  will  buy  tractors, 
one  or  more  of  them,  and  they  will 
plow  the  fields  one  after  the  other, 
thus  doing  the  work  of  many  small 
proprietors.  I  think  the  outlook  for 
the  introduction  of  mechanical  trac- 
tors in  France  is  one  of  the  most  in- 
teresting that  is  now  open  to  you. 

Another  similar  illustration  is  the 
enormous  business  which  will  result 
in  France  after  the  war  from  taking 
care  of  the  immense  number  of  half- 
worn  automobiles,  trucks  and  tractors 
which  at  the  end  of  the  war  the  Gov- 
ernment will  throw  on  the  market. 
If  you  go  about  in  France  now  you  are 
astonished  at  the  amazing  number  of 

123] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


tractors,  of  automobiles,  of  mechan- 
ical trucks  with  which  the  country  is 
filled.  After  the  war  these  half-worn 
or  not-at-all-worn  machines  will  be 
thrown  in  uncounted  thousands  on  the 
market.  That  is  being  dealt  with  in 
a  serious  way  already. 

I  know  two  French  companies  that 
are  organizing  themselves  to  deal 
with  these  machines  after  the  war.  It 
seems  to  me  that  there  is  again  some- 
thing for  American  capital.  The  pur- 
pose is  to  organize  all  over  France 
transportation  companies  to  deal  with 
the  local  trafific  up  to  the  railway  sta- 
tion. 

Let  us  go  back  a  little  and  consider 
how  French  railways,  alone  among 
the  railways  of  the  world,  were  con- 
structed on  a  scientific  plan.  In  Eng- 
land and  everywhere  else  they  were 
built  perfectly  haphazard.  Anybody 
and  everybody,  for  example,  could 
build  a  railroad  in  England  or  Amer- 
ica.   Everybody  could  get  a  charter. 

[24] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


But  in  France  the  whole  railroad 
system  was  laid  out  on  a  system- 
atic plan.  Five  companies  were  or- 
ganized. The  lines  radiated  from 
Paris  to  every  part  of  the  country. 
These  lines  were  built  so  that  there 
was  no  duplication,  and  no  competi- 
tion in  the  territory  meted  out  to  the 
different  companies  or  between  the 
important  towns  which  were  reached. 
Then  every  other  part  of  the  country 
had  to  be  reached  by  subsidiary  lines. 
After  the  war  it  is  proposed  to  use 
these  traction  companies  to  gather  up 
merchandise  and  traffic  and  bring  it 
to  the  nearest  railway  station.  That 
is  one  of  the  points  that  is  now  being 
discussed. 

I  do  not  know  that  it  is  quite  perti- 
nent to  anything  that  you  are  now 
considering,  but  the  banking  business 
offers  the  largest  possibilities  for 
American  enterprise.  Most  of  you 
who  have  been  to  Europe  and  who 
have  been  in  French  banks,  know  how 

[25] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


much  the  French  banking  system 
leaves  to  be  desired.  ''They  do  these 
things  better  in  France'^  was  never 
said  of  their  banking  system.  The 
banking  system  of  France  is  bad  in 
all  the  varieties  of  badness,  and  if  we 
except  the  proposed  establishment  of  a 
Banque  d'Exportation  pour  la  France, 
it  shows  no  very  hopeful  sign  of  get- 
ting any  better. 

One  result  of  that  is  that  foreign 
banks  have  begun  to  come  to  the 
country  and  establish  themselves  — 
English  ibanks,  American  banks, 
Spanish  banks,  Italian  banks,  and 
South  American  banks.  Any  kind  of 
a  bank  is  better  than  a  French  bank, 
I  am  sorry  to  say.  And  so  in 
Paris  the  Equitable  Trust  Co.,  the 
Farmers'  Loan  and  Trust  Company, 
the  Guaranty  Trust  Co.,  the  First 
National  Bank,  the  London  and  West- 
minster Bank,  and  others  are  taking 
hold  of  the  banking  business  in  Paris 
and  making  themselves  felt. 

[26] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


But  that  is  not  the  point.  That 
is  not  the  great  field  for  American 
banking  enterprise  in  France.  That 
is  simply  supplementing  a  bad  sys- 
tem. The  place  that  is  open  to 
us  in  France  is  to  do  what  the 
German  banks — God  save  the  mark 
— have  done  for  their  country.  Most 
of  you,  perhaps  all  of  you,  know 
better  than  I  that  the  commercial 
prosperity  of  Germany,  the  develop- 
ment of  German  industry,  manufac- 
turing and  commercial,  was  due  very 
largely  to  the  intelligent  co-operation 
of  the  German  banks,  with  their  local 
industries. 

That  is  to  say,  in  every  town 
in  Germany,  little  or  big  —  every- 
where in  Germany — the  manufacturer 
who  had  an3'thing  in  him,  whose 
business  had  any  fair  promise  of  de- 
velopment, could  go  to  his  bank  and 
could  get  all  the  assistance  that  he 
wanted  to  develop  his  industry.  The 
bank  became  a  sort  of  partner  with 

[27] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


him.  That  happened  all  through  Ger- 
many: it  never  happened  in  France. 
To  a  French  banker  that  is  unthink- 
able. 

I  have  preached  this  doctrine  in 
season  and  out  of  season  there  for 
years.  I  have  been  the  voice  of  one 
crying  in  the  wilderness  for  this  long 
while,  to  get  American  banks  not  to 
come  to  France  simply  to  be  bankers 
in  the  sense  that  they  go  over  there 
now,  but  to  go  with  the  fixed 
purpose  to  do  in  France  what  the 
German  banks  did  and  undoubtedly 
will  do  again  for  the  building  up  of 
German  industry.  There  is  an  enor- 
mous field  for  that  sort  of  thing  in 
France. 

These  are  some  of  the  many  things 
that  will  occur  to  everyone  of  us. 
Where  everything  is  lacking,  it  is  easy 
to  find  an  illustration  of  what  will  be 
wanted.  When  I  prepared  the  outline 
of  these  remarks  I  felt  a  great  deal 
more  confident  of  my  ability  to  make 

[28] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


suggestions  than  I  do  now,  after  hav- 
ing been  there  all  day  and  hearing  the 
report  of  your  Secretary,  and  getting 
some  information  as  to  the  manifold 
activities  of  your  association. 

But  I  have  brought  you  two  recom- 
mendations, and  I  shall  make  them  for 
what  they  are  worth,  or  for  what  they 
are  not  worth.  If  I  may  be  pardoned  a 
recommendation  to  the  individual 
members  of  your  association  who  de- 
sire to  participate  in  any  business 
open  to  them  in  France,  I  should  say, 
lose  no  time  in  getting  in  contact  with 
business  in  France — commence  now. 
I  do  not  know  that  it  is  very  clever 
for  me  to  seem  to  urge  American 
manufacturers  or  merchants  to  go  af- 
ter business;  but  if  business  is  to  be 
sought  in  France,  no  time  should  be 
lost  in  establishing  the  relation. 

One  of  the  most  striking  develop- 
ments of  the  last  years  in  Paris  has 
been  the  number  of  men  who  have 
come  into  my  office  with  letters  of  in- 

[29] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


troduction  from  America,  looking  to 
place  themselves  in  line  for  business 
in  the  French  markets,  in  every  sort  of 
business — big  business  and  little  busi- 
ness. The  point  I  make  is  this:  You 
who  wish  to  do  business  in  France  af- 
ter the  war  should  begin  now.  You 
should  lose  no  time. 

My  second  recommendation  is  to 
your  Association  as  an  Association. 
Perhaps  this  also  is  supererogatory. 
It  is  to  constitute  a  commission  to 
study  and  advise  on  the  industrial  and 
economic  problems  that  will  arise 
after  the  war.  I  recognize  all  that 
you  have  done.  I  recognize  all  the 
activities  that  you  are  developing,  and 
all  the  different  commissions  and  or- 
ganizations which  exist  now  in  con- 
nection with  your  Association;  but  it 
seems  to  me  that  not  one  of  them  has 
quite  come  to  that  point. 

My  precise  recommendation  is  that 
you  organize  a  commission  to  study 
and  advise  on  the  industrial  and  eco- 

[30] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


nomic  problems  that  will  arise  after 
the  war  and  that  this  commission 
should  be  recognized  and  authorized 
by  the  Government.  It  ought  to 
be  a  manufacturers'  commission, 
so  that  it  may  have  the  benefit 
of  private  initiative  and  have  some  go 
in  it,  but  it  should  have  the  approval 
and  support  and  sanction  of  the  Gov- 
ernment. 

France  has  several  such  commis- 
sions, which  are  working  very  intelli- 
gently in  considering  all  the  possible 
and  probable  problems  which  may 
confront  the  French  people  after 
the  war — notably  the  Bureau  of  Eco- 
nomic Studies,  created  under  the  di- 
rection of  the  President  of  the  Council 
in  1915,  and  the  Commission  on  Eco- 
nomic Reorganization,  of  the  present 
year.  No  longer  ago  than  March  of 
this  year  the  general  question  of  com- 
merce and  industry  after  the  war  was 
made  part  of  the  order  of  the  day  by 
the  Chamber. 


[31] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


The  measures  necessary  for  the 
economic  preparedness  of  France 
were  on  that  occasion  declared  by  M. 
Valliere,  amid  general  approval,  to 
embrace  the  following  urgent  re- 
forms: 

(1)  .  Reduction  of  the  price  of 
French  manufactures  by  moderniza- 
tion, standardization  and  improved 
technique. 

(2)  .  Diffusion  of  the  methods 
learned  through  the  war. 

(3)  .  Improvement  of  relations  be- 
tween capital  and  labor. 

(4)  .  Improvement  of  technical  ed- 
ucation and  of  the  apprenticeship  sys- 
tem. 

(5)  .  The  co-operation  of  shops  and 
yards  for  studies  and  researches  of  all 
kinds,  for  the  purchase  of  raw  ma- 
terial, the  discovery  of  markets,  the 
shipments  of  finished  products  at 
common  expense. 

(6)  .  Adaptation  of  French  pro- 
ducts to  the  taste  of  customers,  as  a 

[32] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


means  toward  the  conquest  of  foreign 
markets. 

(7)  .  Development  and  cheapening 
of  transportation. 

(8)  .  Retention  of  French  money 
for  French  enterprise;  establishment 
of  financial  facilities,  such  as  long 
credits,  etc. 

(9)  .  Reservation  of  mineral  re- 
sources for  the  French,  with  limited 
concessions  of  mines,  and  state  par- 
ticipation in  the  profits. 

(10)  .  Assistance  to  production, 
with  a  view  to  reducing  imports. 

(11)  .  Assistance  with  a  view  to  in- 
creasing exports  of  manufactures. 

(12)  .  Abolition  of  administrative 
restrictions  through  liberal  legisla- 
tion. 

(13)  .  Increasing  the  number  of 
state  enterprises,  and  of  those  in 
which  the  state  shares  in  the  profits. 

(14.)  Initiation  of  vast  public 
works  on  roads  and  railroads,  the 
deepening   of    rivers    and  harbors, 

[33] 


FRANCE       AND  HER 


the  building  of  a  merchant  marine 
and  of  new  marine  basins. 

(15).  Immediate  utilization  of 
France's  exceptional  waterpower. 

(16.)  Supplying  farmers  with 
necessary  implements  and  fertilizers. 

These  are  some  of  the  ways  in 
which  France  is  tackling  the  economic 
problems  of  the  near  future.  She  will 
need  our  help  and  will  welcome  our 
co-operation. 

Accordingly,  it  seems  to  me — if  I 
do  say  it  as  ought  not  to  say  it— 
that  this  Association  might  well  con- 
sider the  advisability  of  constituting 
a  commission  for  study  and  work 
along  at  least  some  of  these  lines. 

«|c         >jc  sfc 

This,  Gentlemen,  is  the  message 
with  which  I  have  felt  myself  charged 
in  addressing  you  to-day. 

I  bring  to  you  in  conclusion,  Men 
of  America,  a  word  of  cheer  and  good 
will  from  France.    We  are  going  to 

[34] 


INDUSTRIAL  NEEDS 


win  this  war,  mostly  by  the  united 
efforts  of  our  two  great  democra- 
cies, and  after  the  war,  proud  in 
our  racial  primacy,  we  shall  stand 
together  more  and  more  in  the 
forefront  of  the  new  civilization  — 
France  and  America,  America  and 
France,  twin  sisters  of  1776  and  1789, 
looking  not  backward  to  our  common 
and  glorious  past,  but  forward  to  our 
future,  big  with  promise  for  us  and 
our  emancipated  children. 


Charles  F.  Beach. 

24  boulevard  des  Capucines, 
Paris.    June,  1918. 


[35] 


